Not on Thy Grace, But On Your Merits
So the time has come, finally.
No more upper classes and lower classes in India and certainly not in Kerala. We had long back stopped discriminating others based on caste or religion. Nobody really think in terms of caste, particularly when it is about a marriage or job. Everybody is accepted everywhere, including the old lower caste priests now in temples run by an upper caste majority. Oh! Sorry! There is no such thing as upper caste and lower caste. Don't ever repeat that kind of classification. Its no longer there. As a punishment, I will write it 100 times on a piece of paper. Suddenly I will see that ideal world. Isn't it magic?
How many years passed after freedom? Fifty to sixty years is the average life time of a human being and we have completely eradicated the problems that led to reservations to the deprived in the time span of just one generation. That's music to my ears. Let's get this message to the world where racism is still an issue. They should learn from us. Seeing us and learning by example, they will be able to get rid of a curse that has been in their society for centuries, in no time.
Reservations are now an old story. Now everything is, or should be, based on merit. Only merited should go through. That makes sense. Doesn't it? After all, we know the definition of what merit is! So get those handicapped persons off their jobs because there are others who will do better than them. No more jobs to widows or the relatives of that deceased while he/she was in service because there are others more deserving. Don't give that seat to him/her just because he is good in football or cricket or swimming and nothing else. Let him go and play on the streets. No donations, please. At least, don't talk about it please. This is for us, who have been studying 24 hours/day, 7 days per week. We deserve it more than anybody else.
This is for us and our children, who have the privilege and fortune to switch on those emergency lamps during power cuts, who have the money to buy whatever books we want to supplement our otherwise mean brain, who have the bank balance to send us to tution that requires thousands per month, who do not really care whether there are classes at school or college due to strikes or hartals or bandhs or any other constipation theory. We are the right people because we can afford to read news papers everyday, watch more than one news channels on more than one televisions, access to information because of internet connectivity and what more, parents and relatives who can answer our doubts or recommend us to any positions, although we do not really need it. And you see we have our full time for studies, not like those ones who struggle and do part time job to meet their daily needs.
See! Our point is that there is no more poverty or discrimination in society on any grounds. All conditions are equal. When all conditions are equal, if we get 90 marks, we should get that admission, right? Since all conditions are equal, we are better than him/her who got 80 marks, right? Yes! We attended the same examination, right? Same questions, right? Same evaluators, right? What more? We sat on the same bench to write the exam. All conditions equal, right? You got it now. This is what we are talking about. Since this is a perfect world, we can always have perfect solutions. And you know what? There is a good chance that we will go abroad for higher studies or job. What will they do even if they manage to pass the hurdles? Can't you see that we make better citizens?
So we, the people of today and tomorrow, who earn six digit salary, who sits in the comfort of an a/c room and a connected computer, who did not have the advantage of reservations till today or who had achieved financial stability and social status due to the same reservations, unanimously declare that reservation is no longer needed. Or if you insist, give the reservation only on the basis of annual income so that we can conveniently forget many others. By the theory of mathematical induction or using a curve of extrapolation, all OBCs and SC/STs have attained forward status as of today (dated and signed). After all, this is India sans corruption, as we have passed fifty years of freedom. More than the facts, that figure horrifies us. Long live equality.
I agree. Not on thy grace, but only and ONLY on your merits.
References:
Mandatharangal
Time and Tide
No more upper classes and lower classes in India and certainly not in Kerala. We had long back stopped discriminating others based on caste or religion. Nobody really think in terms of caste, particularly when it is about a marriage or job. Everybody is accepted everywhere, including the old lower caste priests now in temples run by an upper caste majority. Oh! Sorry! There is no such thing as upper caste and lower caste. Don't ever repeat that kind of classification. Its no longer there. As a punishment, I will write it 100 times on a piece of paper. Suddenly I will see that ideal world. Isn't it magic?
How many years passed after freedom? Fifty to sixty years is the average life time of a human being and we have completely eradicated the problems that led to reservations to the deprived in the time span of just one generation. That's music to my ears. Let's get this message to the world where racism is still an issue. They should learn from us. Seeing us and learning by example, they will be able to get rid of a curse that has been in their society for centuries, in no time.
Reservations are now an old story. Now everything is, or should be, based on merit. Only merited should go through. That makes sense. Doesn't it? After all, we know the definition of what merit is! So get those handicapped persons off their jobs because there are others who will do better than them. No more jobs to widows or the relatives of that deceased while he/she was in service because there are others more deserving. Don't give that seat to him/her just because he is good in football or cricket or swimming and nothing else. Let him go and play on the streets. No donations, please. At least, don't talk about it please. This is for us, who have been studying 24 hours/day, 7 days per week. We deserve it more than anybody else.
This is for us and our children, who have the privilege and fortune to switch on those emergency lamps during power cuts, who have the money to buy whatever books we want to supplement our otherwise mean brain, who have the bank balance to send us to tution that requires thousands per month, who do not really care whether there are classes at school or college due to strikes or hartals or bandhs or any other constipation theory. We are the right people because we can afford to read news papers everyday, watch more than one news channels on more than one televisions, access to information because of internet connectivity and what more, parents and relatives who can answer our doubts or recommend us to any positions, although we do not really need it. And you see we have our full time for studies, not like those ones who struggle and do part time job to meet their daily needs.
See! Our point is that there is no more poverty or discrimination in society on any grounds. All conditions are equal. When all conditions are equal, if we get 90 marks, we should get that admission, right? Since all conditions are equal, we are better than him/her who got 80 marks, right? Yes! We attended the same examination, right? Same questions, right? Same evaluators, right? What more? We sat on the same bench to write the exam. All conditions equal, right? You got it now. This is what we are talking about. Since this is a perfect world, we can always have perfect solutions. And you know what? There is a good chance that we will go abroad for higher studies or job. What will they do even if they manage to pass the hurdles? Can't you see that we make better citizens?
So we, the people of today and tomorrow, who earn six digit salary, who sits in the comfort of an a/c room and a connected computer, who did not have the advantage of reservations till today or who had achieved financial stability and social status due to the same reservations, unanimously declare that reservation is no longer needed. Or if you insist, give the reservation only on the basis of annual income so that we can conveniently forget many others. By the theory of mathematical induction or using a curve of extrapolation, all OBCs and SC/STs have attained forward status as of today (dated and signed). After all, this is India sans corruption, as we have passed fifty years of freedom. More than the facts, that figure horrifies us. Long live equality.
I agree. Not on thy grace, but only and ONLY on your merits.
References:
Mandatharangal
Time and Tide
posted by Myna | 10:30 PM
6 Comments:
Thanks a lot for dropping by, for the comments and giving the link. This is a very complex issue no doubt. Quota or no quota, I don't think there is any issue about merit. Does our likeness for caste, religion or language ever be a substitute for merit?
Pradeep,
The marks or grade might not really reflect merit because the competition is not among equals. You may have a look at my post "Rank: A Curse and a Burden".
And there are a lot of people out there who need a lift just because they don't have an equal and fair environment to compete.
Admit that the reservations are misutilised. Of course, it is time to change, but a solution is far from being implemented with the present system we have. But if we have a choice, it is this misutilisation that we need to change first.
The world is not fair and it will never be. It is not a black and white problem. The more we fix the grey areas, good for everybody.
I also dream about a time where everybody treat others with respect and equality but it will remain as a dream.
I am a citizen of a country, where majority has rights..and i belong to minority group. We didn't have policies meant for us..still we survived..It isn't reservation, classification etc tht matters at the end of the day..it is just determination..and I strongly believe any one can have tht
We all see it from different perspectives, probably influenced by the environment we have grown up, books we have read, people we have seen.
Reminds me the blind men who went to see the elephant.
Everybody was right and at the same time wrong.
There is another side to the issue, if one were to take a spiritual perspective. This country was gifted the highest of truths, very long ago, which are to be found in her sages of old, their teachings and their writings. But what she made of that great inheritence was to opress her fellow man, create castes and creeds, and literally ensalve those who should be free - all in the name of truth.
With the gift of higher truth also comes great responsibility. And when truth is misused, the punishment is just as heavy. She was in turn ensalved to a conquering nation, and found herself literally ground under that heel, much as she opressed her own supposedly lower castes.
What Mohandas Gandhi and the founders did in terms of the 'harijans' was absolutely essential for the survival of this country as a nation, a minor recompensation for past acts; trying to lift that horrendous karma that keeps the nation in poverty and misery. Otherwise India could have ceased to exist as a single nation.
It is not yet time for those recompensing acts to be abolished to make way for merit. For there is much more she has to endure before her sun truly rises.
Race between bullock cart and motor cycle riders.
In the past, motor cycle riders used to win always.
In the present, the best of bullock cart and horse riders are given due representation. Some of them come with motor cycles disguised in bullock carts.
Future:
Go back to the past?
Allow disguised motor cycles riders forever?
Definitely not.
But as long as there are people who live with bullock carts alone, they must be given a FAIR race. And don't say that motor cycle riders are the smartest, particularly when the job is about flying an aeroplane. Who says that the race and the time of completing it is the only qualification criteria?
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